This week marks ten years since the launch of the war in Iraq.

I was a young Captain at the time, and part of the force sent there just after the fall of Baghdad, in 2003. Initially, I wasn't opposed to the war. What did I know,...

On the dawn of sequestration, Republicans are still in deep disagreement over how it will affect our military, and in even deeper disagreement over how to handle it. One thing they do seem to agree on, though, is that they aren't willing to close corporate tax loopholes to avoid it.

After a lot of fake controversy, Chuck Hagel has finally been confirmed as Secretary of Defense -- something I said would happen all along. But, out of this whole situation, three things are now true.

First, troops finally have one of their own at the top, in the Pentagon....

The announcement last week of a Distinguished Warfare Medal for drone operators and cyberwar practitioners only serves to highlight why we need Chuck Hagel to be Secretary of Defense.

Though the issue of drones is raging hot and heavy, I personally don't have an issue with the medal itself. Troops...

A funny thing happened at the Senate Armed Services Committee vote on Chuck Hagel, this week. Senator Ted Cruz, who is quickly making a name for himself as a modern-day Joe McCarthy, turned a normal committee vote into his own personal circus, making outlandish smear after outlandish smear against Chuck...

The hysterics of neoconservative senators has become a cacophony that's pretty similar to a room full of children. It's a series of tantrums that clearly shows they are losing, badly.

Senator Lindsey Graham says the Obama administration should "reconsider" the nomination of Chuck Hagel to...

"Tell me I was right on Iraq!"

Essentially, that's what Sen. McCain said during most of his time in today's confirmation hearing for Chuck Hagel. And that sums up why the die had been cast on the Hagel nomination, before we even got to these...

Much has been said about President Obama's inauguration address possibly signaling an era of the bold, positive change so many expected from him. Today, a monumental move has been made, which shows that is exactly what is happening.

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has officially lifted the Pentagon...

As the Obama adminstration prepares to meet with Hamid Karzai at the White House on Friday, something significant is happening at the White House regarding Afghanistan, and it is good for American security and our troops.

Not coincidentally, it has to do with two combat veterans, with...

Watching the right-wing try to scare President Obama from nominating Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense has only reinforced the image of Republicans becoming as nonsensical and crazy as the fringe loons that keep driving them further and further to the maniacal right.

You know, the base of the party...

The neocons are at it again. Bill Kristol doesn't like that Vietnam Veteran and potential Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel has a more reasoned view on the use of force than Kristol and other neocons.

So what does Kristol do? He tosses out the outrageous, false attack...

It's a provocative headline from Politico: "Veterans Retreating from President Obama."

Provocative, but not exactly true.

First, in the spirit of disclosure, I talked with the reporter who wrote the piece for 45 minutes, and walked him through the many reasons that veterans (especially younger veterans) are supporting...

Watch the now infamous Romney tapes, starting at the 4-minute mark. A questioner asks him about foreign policy and they start to talk about the hostage crisis in 1980. Then Romney drops this nugget:

And yet, in that election, in the Jimmy Carter election, the fact that we...

I think back to Mitt Romney, in 2007, saying it wasn't "worth moving heaven and earth" to get Osama bin Laden, and the Iraq veteran in me thanks God he wasn't president these past few years.

For those wondering, that's not a made-up quote. Romney said it in...

The voting rights of our men and women in uniform are under attack, and it's time for the Pentagon to take action.

As has been reported for the past few months, there are dozens of efforts to restrict ballot access, both under consideration and already enacted from

Buried beneath the news of the Wisconsin recall election and Republicans blocking equal pay for women in the Senate was perhaps the most significant news in the war on terror since the death of Osama bin Laden : Abu Yahya al-Libi was killed in a drone...

In 2009, I went on TV in a debate against Congressman Phil Gingrey, the Georgia Republican who wanted to fund the purchase of F-22 fighter jets that the Pentagon didn't want, and said were useless in the wars we were fighting and will be fighting in the future....

One of the advantages of serving a couple of tours in Iraq as an officer is the number of contacts I've made who have gone on to be senior planners in Afghanistan. What I am hearing from them about the state of things in Afghanistan, and reading the tea leaves,...

Over the last few weeks, thousands of people from across the country have taken to the streets to demand the biggest corporations in the U.S. pay their fair share of taxes. Last week, Bank of America was the latest corporation to face the wrath of shareholders and protesters for its...

After serving two tours in Iraq, a neo-con engineered war having nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks, the latest political attack by Mitt Romney and his fellow Republicans leaves me completely confused.

President Obama's campaign has released a 90-second video, featuring President Clinton,
highlighting...